Country and western rhinestones meet French couture in Paris.
The tallest evening gowns the fashion world has ever seen - one sugar pink, the other black - dominated the catwalk at the Viktor & Rolf show in Paris last week. They turned out to be worn by singers on stilts - the French girl band Brigitte, to be precise - who provided a live soundtrack and whose pleated skirts parted like curtains through which models emerged.
Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren - the names behind the label - are not strangers to this type of blockbuster presentation. Models dressing and undressing on stage, tap dancing or painted matt black from head to toe have all made an appearance on the Viktor & Rolf catwalk before now.
There was a distinct country and western flavour to the clothes proper this time around. Rhinestones aplenty, giant stitching in contrasting colours and a predominantly short, sassy silhouette were pure Dolly Parton meets French couture. These designers are invariably attached to the latter: pussy-cat bows, little black dresses and an ongoing love affair with ruffles and frills all characterise their work. Such bourgeois fashion folly was, once again, blown up to cartoonish proportions, raising the question: however amusing they may be, will they translate into real clothes?
Earlier, Junya Watanabe came up with sweet lace dresses embroidered with peacock feathers and meadow flowers and cropped biker jackets with overblown layered organza sleeves. While far from banal, this was the sort of clothing which is aimed squarely at the most discerning of fashion followers, so proudly individual and lovely it is to see. As if to drive home Watanabe's skills as a pattern cutter par excellence, his show ended with a sequence of immaculate and discreetly complex gabardine trench coats - a classic garment reinvented to the most elegant effect.
